chiefs in council, having satisfactorily ascertained that his second
brother "Red-hand," and a squaw, had poisoned him, decreed that Red-hand
should be put to death. "Black-snake," the other brother, told the chiefs
that if Red-hand must die, he himself would kill him, in order to prevent
feuds arising in the tribe. Accordingly in the evening he repaired to the
hut of Red-hand, and after having sat in silence for some time, said, "My
best chiefs say, you have killed my father's son,--they say my brother
must die." Red-hand merely replied, "They say so;" and continued to smoke.
After about fifteen minutes further silence, Black-snake said, pointing to
the setting sun, "When he appears above those trees"--moving his arm round
to the opposite direction--"I come to kill you." Red-hand nodded his head
in the short significant style of the Indian, and said "Good." The next
morning Black-snake came, followed by two chiefs, and having entered the
hut, first put out the squaw, he then returned and stood before his
brother, his eyes bent on the ground. Red-hand said calmly, "Has my
brother come that I may die?"--"It is so," was the reply. "Then,"
exclaimed Red-hand, grasping his brother's left hand with his own right,
and dashing the shawl from his head, "Strike sure!" In an instant the
tomahawk was from the girdle of Black-snake, and buried in the skull of
the unfortunate man. He received several blows before he fell, uttering
the exclamation "hugh," each time. The Indians placed him on the grass to
die, where the backwoodsman who told me the story, saw him after the lapse
of two hours, and life was not then extinct,--with such tenacity does it
cling to the body of an Indian. The scalping knife was at length passed
across his throat, and thus ended the scene.

From Sandusky city, in Huron county, I passed into Sandusky county, and
from thence through Seneca county. These three counties are entirely
woodlands, with the exception of a few small prairies which lay eastward
of my course. The land is generally fertile. Some light sandy soil is